Coming Salons:
STARTING IN NOVEMBER:
SALON INTENSIVE Wide Sargasso Sea:
Jean Rhys, an early Modernist writer, chose to explore Bertha Rochester’s history in her brief but crystalline work. In Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys confronts the possibility of another side to Jane Eyre. The story of Bertha, the first Mrs Rochester, Wide Sargasso Sea is not only a brilliant deconstruction of Brontë’s legacy, but is also a damning history of colonialism in the Caribbean.
Designed for those who are unable to commit to a longer study, the Salon Intensive provides a full immersion in a shorter work of literature in one 4 hour intensive study. Readers will want to read the work in preparation; we will share a potluck meal midway through the evening to feed our bodies while our minds are humming along…
Justine by Lawrence Durrell (Tuesday evenings): 4 week study starting November 11th
Lawrence Durrell’s Alexandria Quartet has provoked a variety of responses from ‘astounding tour de force’ to ‘flawed masterpiece’.Transcending critique is appreciation for Durrell’s stylistic elegance– the gorgeous form with which he explores the sensual and dangerous world of Alexandria in aftermath of WW II. Our study will also consider how the a Western mind portrays the Eastern world–and how we are all outsiders looking in.
In Search of Lost Time: Vol. 2 Within a Budding Grove Wednesday evenings/ Wednesday afternoons starting November 19th –8 meetings (break for winter holidays) We have been enjoying the slowed-down reflection and deep consideration this masterpiece evokes. As one Salonista said:”This is a velvet jewel of a book that demands the attention of a lover full of enchantment and obsession ,we need not get impatient as all good lovers perfect their art in taking their time…”
Starting in January: 20 week study of James Joyce’s Ulysses
*registration is open: the afternoon sessions are almost full…
This week in the Guardian John Sutherland writes a list of the books he has been unable to finish. His comments–and the hundreds of readers’ comments that followed (Ulysses, Moby Dick and Absalom, Absalom! figured largely in the comments as unreadable works)–did little to address the question of why reading a challenging work is valuable…so here is what I added:
‘Oddly no one is talking about WHY do the work necessary to read the challenging books– my work- or mission, perhaps- is to support readers in exploring the great & hard works– right now, am in the midst of a Proust study with a wonderful group of readers and am watching minds expand and connect as we move more deeply into questions around time, love, desire and the role of memory…Ulysses- the great unreadable–is one of the funniest & most accurate examinations of intimate relationships and the negotiations involved there that I have ever seen portrayed in any art.
We read these works to understand what it means to be human– and that takes time and effort and attention…if you want to tackle the big reads, try reading with a group. Moby Dick is mind-blowing–and Absalom, Absalom will offer insights into race, class, pride and sexual tensions that will blow your mind.’
So those who have just completed Absalom, Absalom! and those who have tackled Moby Dick, Ulysses and Proust– well done. We are pushing against the tide of distraction and limited attention that reduces the mind to sound bytes.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/shortcuts/2014/oct/08/my-top-10-unfinishable-novels
